Our own little Christmas

For the first time since we've been married, we actually stayed at our own place for Christmas this year. At first I was really sad that we weren't gonna be able to come home, but as it sank into my head a little more each day, and as we convinced ourselves that it would be fun to be out here by ourselves, we actually got pretty excited for it. Me and Had went shopping for the kids together, and picked out presents that we were sure they would go crazy over. This alone, got us very excited. We were like 2 little kids that couldn't wait till Christmas morning either. We talked with Jete about it every day and reminded him that he had to be a good boy so he wouldn't be on the naughty list. It usually worked.....for the next five minutes. Then he would forget and go back to tackling, teasing, kicking Jerzi, or doing some sort of punkishness. My sister that lives in Egypt made us this cute advent calendar and filled it with presents from there. Jete loved it and first thing every morning (and sometimes after naps) he would ask if he could open another present. He was super excited for Christmas to come and sometimes he would start crying. When we asked him what was wrong he would say "I just want to open some presents".

Don't worry, we also talked to him about the real meaning of Christmas, and taught him about the Christmas story. He was excited to celebrate Jesus' birthday and asked if we could make a birthday cake for Jesus on Christmas.

CHRISTMAS EVE

Ok, so a typical Christmas Eve in Idaho usually consists of me going into town a few times to get the last odds and ends and that I've forgotten, or that others have forgotten. Had is usually out in the woodshop finishing up the homemade gift that "we" have to make one of my siblings each year. Then we usually have a couple Christmas Eve parties to go to later in the day. I usually love the craziness and excitement of this day, but it is tiring and busy. This year was SO different. For starters, I had my Christmas shopping done a few weeks before Christmas. (I know, you people that know me well aren't believing me, but it's true.) I made my sister's present this year, and got it sent to her so she got it before Christmas. (Shocking, I know!) We spent Christmas Eve at our house, hanging out with each other. I made home made rolls, and the whole family made candy cane cookies. Then that night, we went to our friend's house for a delicious Christmas Eve dinner. We stuffed ourselves, Jete tried to play in the snow, and we came home and put the kids to bed early and me and Had cuddled on the couch and watched a movie. It felt so weird and fun and like...our own little Christmas.

CHRISTMAS DAY

What we would have been doing Christmas Day in Idaho: We would have stayed with one of our parents, woke up our kids too early for them to be excited about anything, opened presents, and then rush over to the next parents house, opened presents, and then over to the next parents house. Then we usually repeat that process throughout the day (minus the opening presents part) because we didn't actually get to spend time seeing or visiting with anyone earlier. Jete and Jerzi probs would have skipped their naps that day, and maybe a meal or two because there's no time when you're running from house to house. Jete and Jerzi wouldn't have got to actually play with any of their presents because we have to ship it back out to Ohio. And when there's a ton of other neices and nephews around, all their toys either get mixed up, taken, broken or lost before they even know it's gone. At the end of the day, we're all glad its over.

Instead our Christmas Day went a little like this: We slept in until Jerzi woke up, around 8ish. We played with her in our bed until Jete woke up about 15 minutes later. He came and crawled in with us and we laughed and played for a little. Then Had said to Jete, "Jete should we go check and see if Santa came last night?" Jete's eyes lit up (he had totally forgotten that it was Christmas Day) as he realized what had happened that night and he dashed out of our room to head downstairs. We went and opened presents, ate stocking candy, played with presents, then ate breakfast. We lounged around all morning, playing with ALL the fun new toys and games, then ate lunch, and we all took a nap. We hung out in our pj's all day, tried watching the Lakes but gave up on them, our house was a disaster, and we all just loved it. We ate leftovers from our Christmas Eve dinner and watched our new movie "Despicable Me" together. It was such a fun relaxing day!

Here's Jerzi, loving her presents. (She really was excited about those boots. She wouldn't put them down.)

Here she is playing with her new doggie and wearing those cute little shoes. She is obessesed with shoes and wore them all morning. She loved her new babies too. They were giving her kisses in this picture.




So Jete asked Santa for 2 things for Christmas. A real dirt bike and a monster truck. Santa left the monster truck and 2 little dirt bikes sitting out on the couch, and Jete didn't even notice them. Instead he went right over to the bike and said, "I see a big bike.... that has training wheels! I think I can ride that." Then he went over to Jerzi's present that Santa left her and said, "Oh man, I really wanted Jerzi to get this for Christmas." Either he's very thoughtful, or he wanted to play with it himself. I'm not really sure which it was. Either way, it was funny to me.



Here's Jete, loving his presents.

And here's our giant mess!

Turns out having our own little Christmas wasn't too shabby after all.

(The next week though was super boring and uneventful. Had was back at work, and I was at home with the kids, just doing what we do. Meanwhile, our families were all at home, getting together and having fun. We wished we were back home for that week.) We love and missed you all!